Editors' Review

For the most part, Surfulater is everything a Web-clipping utility should be. It interfaces with the right-click menus on Internet Explorer and Firefox. It can save fragments of graphics and text or an entire Web page. It stores each clip in an easily navigable "Knowledge Tree," along with a thumbnail snapshot and the first paragraph of text from the Web page where it was taken. It provides a simple feature for editing clips. It also supplies convenient context-sensitive tooltips and an excellent help file. However, the demo can't create or use additional knowledge bases. Stability was another problem. On one test system, the program crashed several times while capturing large fragments. Once the developers work out those kinks, Surfulater ought to be a great tool for Web researchers of every stripe.

read more +

Sponsored Products

Publisher's Description

With Surfulater you can permanently save selected text, images, and complete Web pages, then edit, annotate, tag, cross-reference, organize, and search for information in your offline personal and portable knowledge base. Surfulater works with Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox. Surfulater also lets you save content from other applications such as MS Word and PDF files, and you can attach and link files to articles.

Personal Information can be kept using a variety of article templates, such as Contacts, To Do List, and Notes. When you use Surfulater you'll never lose important information, or have to worry about Web sites or pages disappearing never to be found again.

This tool seemed to me it could do it. So I installed it, everything OK.

I re-opened IE, went back to the web site I am interested in, tried to download the part I want with a right click, and all I could see is "add a new article... attach page...bookmark this page...". All wrong ! I wanted "Download page" and "Download page + dependencies" or smthg like that : I have probably picked up the wrong tool.

Don't waste your time, I have done it for you :-) and I can afford to waste more time than that in a N+1 so-wonderful tool.

I had been looking for a software to help collect information off the web. Surfulater offers every convenience in collecting web sites whether just links or whole pages. The knowledge base allows easy access to the saved information and helps to organize your collected material. It works well with researching school projects, comparison buying of products or just a collection of ideas. It is an absolute necessity for saving information from the web. Neville Franks the originator of Surfulater is constantly updating this software. I wish I had it 5 years ago.

It does exactly what it says it will do. I use it to save a copy of tidbits of information I come across on the web for reference later. This is a lifesaver being able to capture web pages that may later disappear or the links to them break. I only wish I had this earlier. This is also a program that is not static, updates and improvements are coming out all the time and the author is very responsive to support issues.

I have been looking for a product like this for weeks. I downloaded, installed, and used at least 20 programs, only to become unsatisfied. The thing I hated about most "knowledge bases" was that they seperated information so I couldn't see it all at once. The other thing was, why provide a advanced editor if I am just going to use word anyway?

Surfulator is awesome. You can have different books (that's just my wording) displayed as tabs above. Its an easy way to orginze say, projects, personal, products, school. In each book you can have the standard folders and articles - BUT if you click on a folder named "Roof Materials" you can view all the articals in there...you don't have to select each one. Another great feature is that you can minimize different sections of the artical for quick viewing (you'd have to try it to understand). You can also add an entire web page, just an article, or an artical and a web page (saves the portion of the site you clipped and adds a thumbnail of the entire page which is also saved but minimized). With all of that it is a great "web companion," but it also repaces all of those note tools I downloaded. I can add notes, comments, and attatchements on my own with my own files. For an example, I needed to do an outline of PDF file, so I linked the file to my artical, and the cliped sections that I needed to reference (requirements for a project) and wrote a comment underneath.

Cons

I haven't found any yet...I am slowly unistalling all the do nothing programs I installed in the past few weeks

I have used many bookmark organizer programs, etc, but this works so much better and does much more. Many times I can't remember why I bookmarked a site. With this program, I can give notes about it, copy the text I wanted out of it, link to the original website, and search / organize the folders. Once you try it, it's really tough to go back.

Cons

There are a couple useful features that are "still to come." (Such as text markup and easier printing), but overall it does what I was hoping.

The best tool I've seen to collect and manage any important or worthwhile information you find while surfing the net. No learning curve needed just start improving your surf memory. Works well under both IE and Firefox.

E-mail This Review

Thank You, !

Report Offensive Content

If you believe this comment is offensive or violates the CNET's Site Terms of Use, you can report it below (this will not automatically remove the comment). Once reported, our staff will be notified and the comment will be reviewed.